Last Sight of Lemuria
by adirondack
Summary: Piers leaves his beloved city in the dead of one fated night, launching a quest to save Lemuria and all of Weyard.


If his feet hadn't been leaning up against one of the Senate pillars, he may have fallen over in shock and fright. The old man had appeared out of nowhere.

"You're out late."

Even though the man's words sounded no less apathetic than the average Lemurian citizen's, Piers' heart jumped straight out of his chest.

"Hrg—mmm." _Casual. Casual._ Piers hadn't expected anyone out at night. Nobody cared enough to look at the moon anymore. Nobody retold the stories of their sister clan, the great Anemos, who lifted themselves straight out of the decaying Weyard to rest in the sky as a silvery orb. Nobody even bothered talking to each other, really.

 _Your sword, though…_ At this thought, Piers sharply instructed himself _not_ to draw attention to the weapon hanging at his hip. Or his leather knapsack. He was important enough to have a show sword. Perhaps the man would assume he liked to wear it at all times. And his knapsack was hardly bulging. Most of his supplies were already on the ship. He didn't look like somebody about to start a journey. He didn't.

 _He probably isn't really interested,_ Piers told himself. _He's only surprised to see someone else out at night._ Piers struggled to make his voice sound as listless as everyone else's.

"I—ate something weird at dinner. Feel kind of sick."

This seemed to satisfy the old man, who astonishingly cracked a smile and said, "Me too. Maybe something's gotten to the fish and they aren't healthy. The sea's been a little rougher lately." He coughed. "Drink from the fountain, it'll sort you out."

Piers tried to smile in thanks, but he guessed it turned out a bit wobbly. His heart seemed to be thumping against his ribs and inside his mouth at the same time, though maybe it was just his bones threatening to collapse and turn to dust as he watched the man amble idly away.

 _Get a grip_.

He had told Hydros he could save Lemuria. He had promised. Just yesterday he'd spoken with the confidence of a warrior and seaman. Hadn't he worked in the shipyard his entire, long life, repairing and maintaining vessels moored for centuries? Hadn't he always harbored a curiosity for the outside world? And really, what would anyone do to him if they caught him sailing away? Nobody _felt_ anything strong enough to want to kill him. The most they'd do was yawn and say he ought to go to prison. Piers could deal with prison.

Conservato's indifference toward Gaia Falls' erosion and his resulting politics didn't inspire confidence, though. Out of everything, Piers thought it reasonable to fear _him_.

So he took off his shoes and walked quickly between the pillars of the city square. He clenched his teeth at the soft _pat pat_ of his bare feet on the stone steps as he headed down to the harbor, black orb in bag. On the last step, he felt the twinge of betrayal twist his already exhausted heart.

 _You're not abandoning home. Hydros and Lunpa sent you on this mission. Mother knows you're leaving. Uncle knows you're leaving. You aren't deserting family. You're_ saving _them._

Still, he couldn't help but take one last look up Lemuria's misty cliffs to see the corner of his house. The silvery stone shone in the moonlight, like his mother's hair.

 _You'll see them again._

With that resilient thought, Piers pushed open the door to the harbor. The two guards were—predictably—sleeping. Figured. He stepped cautiously over them, but didn't worry too much. Naro and Mizu. Two of his childhood friends. The two who could be convinced of anything in an instant. Even if they woke up he could talk his way out of it.

His confidence bolstered significantly, Piers breathed in the cool witching hour air and trailed his hand over the damp mossy pillars surrounding the harbor. When he arrived at his ship, he allowed himself one final touch of dewy grass. He inhaled one last breath of the cool, slightly salty Lemurian air that had the faint taste of wet stone. Then he walked up the gangplank and without turning back, pulled it up behind him.

Piers didn't think about home again until the enormous, imposing, infuriated sea-god rose up like a hurricane before his tiny ship. His chest clenched in horror. His sword was a sharp twig; his psynergy a paltry trick. He didn't even attempt to fight back. Madly, he grappled with the wheel and tried to keep the boat steady as the sea god lifted his hands and raised a wave taller than the palace.

It looked as though the water had frozen. He had time to look at the sea god's hands, which nearly touched each other as he held the wave in a vertical position. As Piers gaped in horror, he suddenly found himself staring directly into the immortal's glassy purple eyes. It lasted only a millisecond. Then, with a swiftness that rivaled the wind, Poseidon's arms shot down—and so did the water. A wall of ocean hit Piers in the face. Only his maneuvering of the wheel— _thank you, hundreds of years of helmsman training!_ —stopped the wave from crushing his sheep altogether. He managed to turn the ship around and ride the giant wave over the rocks of the Sea of Time.

Then, silence.

After a few moments of sitting on the damp forecastle, Piers thought he could hear a gull call far off in the distance. He parted his strangely dry lips and slowly released the enormous lungful of air he'd been holding. He'd made it. He made it out. And besides the sea god, nobody should know he had gone.

He allowed himself a smile of satisfaction and reached for his knapsack. Congratulations were in order, he thought, for having the foresight to tether it to the mast the moment one of the whirlpools had started to bubble like a hot spring. _Congratu_ —

But his hand, deep into the knapsack, closed on air. Panic fluttering in his chest—would his heart last even one night of this?—he dug his other arm in, then opened the flap as wide as he could to look inside. There should have been only one thing: the orb. And it was gone.

In Lemuria's early days, Poseidon had counseled Hydros. He'd made friends with the Lemurians, sometimes giving them gifts of weapons fashioned at the bottom of the ocean or powerful magical objects. One immortal to another.

Something rooted extremely deep had changed this sea god from the one of legend. Piers read the new Poseidon's message in the lines of his empty palms.

 _You will never again see Lemuria._


End file.
